ABSTRACT
Kidnapping The crime of kidnapping is the unlawful seizure and detention of a person or persons by force or fraud against their will. Originally the term ‘kidnapping’ denoted seizing a person and taking him or her to another country for involuntary servitude, or the impressment of males into military or naval service by force or fraud. Another form of kidnapping is the abduction and sale of women for prostitution or concubinage, though in most legal codes this is treated as a separate offence of abduction. There have been cases where the main motive for kidnapping has been revenge or cruelty, such as the desire to inflict involuntary servitude on the victim, to cause pain and grief to the victim’s loved ones, or to commit some further crime against the victim. However, in the overwhelming majority (over 90 per cent) of modern kidnappings the main motive is criminal gain. Most of these crimes are committed by criminal gangs seeking to make a fortune by obtaining a ransom for the safe release of the victim. An epidemic of kidnapping for extortion occurred in the USA in the 1920s and 1930s. A particularly notorious case was the 1932 kidnapping of the US flyer Charles Lindbergh’s baby boy. It was partly as a result of outcry over this case that the USA introduced legislation imposing the death penalty for carrying a kidnap victim across State boundaries.
